Live Skull - Dusted

I’ve found that there is generally a nice debate to be had whenever mentioning what was the best era of Live Skull. There isn’t a real big preference for me; however I do tend to lean more towards the Thalia Zedek period. Really the only reason I say that is because my favorite record from the band comes from the very beginning of that portion of the bands life. Dusted was simply one of those records I put on and then found myself putting it on again, and again, and again. However, it was almost like I was doing it unconsciously, as I never really found myself being like, “this is an amazing album; I need to listen to it more”. There really haven’t been too many albums like that for me that just click after a certain amount of listens. I am generally of the type that either likes it right off the bat or doesn’t. It’s hard for an album to grow on me; however Dusted falls into that small fraction of albums that eventually did just that.

While there were many great bands that emerged from the NYC avant-rock scene, Live Skull is probably my favorite. Yes, I am taking them over Sonic Youth. While it took me ages to really come to appreciate what this band did, it was suddenly more apparent at one point that I preferred the more dissonant and dreary side of that movement as opposed to the more experimental side of things and Live Skull were practically perfection in that department. Their music was riddled with dark subject matter and shrieking but amazing guitar work. The album Dusted served as pretty much the turning point for me with the band, being the atmospheric and mood driven piece of work to do so. While their back catalog is arguably as equally amazing as their later material, the more focused approach to the vocals courtesy of Zedek completes the package in my eyes.

Live Skull – Cavity [MP3]
Live Skull – W/ The Light [MP3]
Live Skull – 5-D [MP3]

Unfortunately, like the rest of the bands catalog, Dusted is long since out of print. It would be a wonderful thing to see any of their albums reissued at some point, especially the earlier material that I believe was released only on vinyl. Until then it’s searching through the likes of used record stores and online. Sorry folks. In the meantime though, check out Thalia Zedek’s MySpace to have a listen to her solo work following her stints in Live Skull and Come (also worth checking out!). Enjoy!